GLaDOS comments on Open Thread, November 1-15, 2012 - Less Wrong

4 Post author: OpenThreadGuy 02 November 2012 02:11AM

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Comment author: GLaDOS 04 November 2012 08:25:03AM *  3 points [-]

Are the cads outbreeding the dads? by the anthropologist Peter Frost

That natural selection is shifting males to a more caddish build seems plausible considering the wide variety of social changes in the past few decades caused in part by the changed economics of sex, these include the rise of single motherhood and the various indicators showing a relative decline in male economic and academic performance (Baumaister 2012). The question is whether humans had enough preexisting variation on these traits for natural selection to do this so rapidly. I would lean towards saying yes we did. (~_~;)

The seeming contradiction with high religious fertility is easy to resolve:

  • The very religious cohort is no the only one with relatively high fertility and is rather demographically small and somewhat endogamous.
  • The very religious don't necessarily live up to their standards as well as the less religious or non-religious do, indeed blue vs. red state white American comparisons of behaviours related to sex are often used to point this out.